Socks with lateral plantar arches

ABSTRACT

The present invention relates to a sock having a lateral plantar arch recess, to a sock having the lateral plantar arch recess in which a certain region of a lateral plantar arch support configured to support a lateral plantar arch is formed at a bottom surface of the sock with the lateral plantar arch recess which is recessed upwardly from a lower surface by a certain thickness, so that the center of gravity of a wearer of the sock is moved rearward and outward while the wearer is standing, thereby reducing the load applied to the hallux, and the center of gravity of the wearer of the sock is moved to between first and second metatarsal bones sequentially through calcaneus, a cuboid bone, and a fifth metatarsal bone while the wearer is walking, thereby delaying pronation as much as possible and causing supination to occur more easily after pronation.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application claims the benefit of Korean Patent Application No. 10-2017-0148982 filed Nov. 9, 2017, the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to a sock having a lateral plantar arch recess, and more particularly, to a sock having a lateral plantar arch recess in which a certain region of a lateral plantar arch support configured to support a lateral plantar arch is formed at a bottom surface of the sock with the lateral plantar arch recess which is recessed upwardly from a lower surface by a certain thickness so that the center of gravity of a wearer of the sock is moved rearward and outward while the wearer is standing, thereby reducing the load applied to the hallux, and the center of gravity of the wearer of the sock is moved to between first and second metatarsal bones sequentially through calcaneus, a cuboid bone, and a fifth metatarsal bone while the wearer is walking, thereby delaying pronation as much as possible and causing supination to occur more easily after pronation.

DISCUSSION OF RELATED ART

The bone structure of the human foot has evolved to walk most effectively on flat land, and as a result, the human foot consists of 33 joints, 28 bones, and 44 large and small muscles and tendons, and each of these components performs a unique operation during walking.

As shown in FIG. 1, the bones of a foot include calcaneus, talus, a navicular bone, a cuboid bone, cuneiform, metatarsal bones, phalanxes, and the like.

In addition, two pedal arches are formed on the foot, which are a medial plantar arch on the inside of the foot and a lateral plantar arch on the outside of the foot.

The medial plantar arch is made up of the calcaneus, the talus, the navicular, the cuneiform, and the first metarsal.

In addition, the lateral plantar arch is made up of the calcaneus, the cuboid bone, and the fourth and fifth metatarsal bones.

When the sole of the foot completely touches the ground during walking, that is, when body weight is borne by a lower extremity, a leg bone (particularly the tibia) is turned inwardly while the talus is turned inwardly in the ankle joint so that the medial plantar arch is spread (pronation). Thus, the medial plantar arch plays a role in reducing impact caused by bearing weight. In other words, the medial plantar arch acts like a spring.

However, when a medial plantar arch is unnecessarily over-collapsed (hyper-pronation), various orthopedic disorders occur in the lower extremities. A typical disease that occurs when the medial plantar arch is over-collapsed is a pronation syndrome which is a state of excessive foot pronation (flat feet) with concomitant internal knee rotation and adduction (knock-knees).

Such an excessive distortion pattern causes muscle imbalances that lead to foot, ankle, knee, hip, and back pain, and leads to a change in an alignment of the tibia, femur, and pelvis, thereby increasing the risk of injury to soft tissues (Achilles tendon, pedal arches, patellar-tendon, and iliotibial band) due to the accumulation of internal rotation stress in the pelvis and lower back.

The excessive distortion pattern also compresses the subtalar joint, the patellar joint, the tibiofemoral joint, the iliofemoral joint, and the sacroiliac joint, thereby causing an anterior pelvic tilt of the pelvis.

Pronation of 2° to 3° of a foot causes 20% to 30% of pelvic inclination when standing and 50% to 70% of anterior pelvic tilt when walking, thereby resulting in an imbalanced back and spine.

Therefore, the present inventor proposes a sock which prevents such hyper-pronation and induces supination.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention has been made to solve the above problems, and it is an object of the present invention to provide a sock having a lateral plantar arch recess in which a certain region of a lateral plantar arch support configured to support a lateral plantar arch is formed at a bottom surface of the sock and in which the lateral plantar arch recess is recessed upwardly from a lower surface by a certain thickness so that the center of gravity of a wearer of the sock is moved rearward and outward while the wearer is standing, thereby reducing the load applied to the hallux, and the center of gravity of the wearer of the sock is moved to between first and second metatarsal bones sequentially through calcaneus, a cuboid bone, and a fifth metatarsal bone while the wearer is walking, thereby delaying pronation as much as possible and causing supination to more easily occur after the pronation.

The present invention has the following features to attain the above object.

A sock worn on the foot and having a lateral plantar arch recess, wherein a bottom surface of the sock is formed with the lateral plantar arch recess in which a lateral plantar arch support supporting a lateral plantar arch composed of the calcaneus, the cuboid bone, and the fourth and fifth metatarsal bones of a wearer is recessed from a lower surface in a predetermined region.

The lateral plantar arch recess may be formed in a region configured to support the calcaneus, the cuboid bone, and a certain portion of the fourth and fifth metatarsal bones of the lateral plantar arch support, the bottom surface of the sock excluding the lateral plantar arch recess may be formed to have the same thickness, and the thickness of the lateral plantar arch recess may be formed to be ⅓ to ⅔ of the thickness of the bottom surface of the sock excluding the lateral plantar arch recess.

The lateral plantar arch recess may be formed so that a boundary line located at a side edge of the lateral plantar arch recess is rounded.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The above and other objects, features and advantages of the present invention will become more apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art by describing in detail exemplary embodiments thereof with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which:

FIG. 1 is a view showing a configuration of bones of a foot;

FIG. 2 is a perspective view of a sock according to an embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 3 is a bottom perspective view of the sock according to an embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 4 is a bottom view of the sock according to an embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 5 is a cross-sectional view taken along line A-A′ of FIG. 2; and

FIGS. 6A and 6B are views showing a landing motion process of a wearer of the sock according to an embodiment of the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EXEMPLARY EMBODIMENTS

In order to explain the present invention and the operational advantages of the present invention and the objectives accomplished by the implementation of the inventive concept, hereinafter, a preferred embodiment of the present invention will be exemplified and will be described with reference to examples.

The terms used in the present specification are merely used to describe exemplary embodiments, and are not intended to limit embodiments. An expression used in the singular encompasses the expression of the plural, unless it has a clearly different meaning in the context. In the present specification, it is to be understood that the terms such as “including,” “having,” and “comprising” are intended to indicate the existence of the features, numbers, steps, actions, components, parts, or combinations thereof disclosed in the specification, and are not intended to preclude the possibility that one or more other features, numbers, steps, actions, components, parts, or combinations thereof may exist or may be added.

In the following description of the present invention, when it is determined that detailed descriptions of related well-known functions or configurations unnecessarily obscure the gist of the present invention, the detailed descriptions thereof will be omitted.

FIG. 2 is a perspective view of a sock according to an embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 3 is a bottom perspective view of the sock according to an embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 4 is a bottom view of the sock according to an embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 5 is a cross-sectional view taken along line A-A′ of FIG. 2, and FIGS. 6A and B are views showing a landing motion process of a wearer of the sock according to an embodiment of the present invention.

Referring to the drawings, a sock 100 according to an embodiment of the present invention includes a bottom surface 10 thereof having a lateral plantar arch support 11 and a medial plantar arch support 12.

The lateral plantar arch support 11 and the medial plantar arch support 12 refer to a bottom part of the sock 100, and are configured to respectively support a lateral plantar arch and a medial plantar arch. Here, the lateral plantar arch and the medial plantar arch correspond to two pedal arches of a foot.

The medial plantar arch is made up of calcaneus, talus, a navicular bone, cuneiform, and a first metarsal bone, and the lateral plantar arch is made up of the calcaneus, a cuboid bone, and fourth and fifth metatarsal bones.

In the sock 100 according to the present invention, a lateral plantar arch recess 11 a is formed in a certain region of the lateral plantar arch support 11.

As shown in FIGS. 2 and 3, the entire lateral plantar arch recess 11 a may be formed in a rectangular shape, and both side edges of the lateral plantar arch recess 11 a located at a central side of the bottom surface 10 of the sock 100 may be formed in a round shape.

Due to the formation of the lateral plantar arch recess 11 a, the center of gravity of a wearer of the sock is moved rearward and outward while the wearer is standing, and the center of gravity of the wearer is moved from an outer lateral portion of the calcaneus to the cuboid bone and from the cuboid bone to between the first metatarsal bone and second metatarsal bone through the fifth metatarsal bones while the wearer is walking.

Generally, when the lateral plantar arch recess 11 a is not formed, the center of gravity during standing falls between an anterior side of the talus and a navicular bone, and arch portions support the center of gravity. The center of gravity is divided and moved to the calcaneus and first and fifth metatarsal bones (especially to head portions of the first and fifth metatarsal bones).

In addition, during walking, the center of gravity is moved back from the navicular bone to the talus and moved to the calcaneus, and then moved to between the first and second metacarpal bones through the cuboid bone and a center of the foot.

Here, pronation may occur in which the foot rotates inwardly by a certain angle in accordance with the movement of the center of gravity during walking. However, in a case of a wearer of a sock according to the present invention, 70% to 80% of the center of gravity is weighted on the calcaneus during standing, which is different from the above-mentioned conventional movement of the center of gravity.

In other words, the center of gravity moves from the calcaneus to between first and second metatarsal bones through the cuboid bone and a center of the foot. Thus, the occurrence of pronation occurring in conventional walking is delayed as much as possible, and supination is made to occur more easily after the pronation.

Accordingly, due to the formation of the lateral plantar arch recess 11 a, a movement pattern of the center of gravity during walking is changed, and as a result, the waist is supported, and a pronation distortion syndrome, arthritis, hallux valgus, and plantar fasciitis can be prevented.

As shown in FIGS. 6A and 6B, when a wearer of a sock according to the present invention is standing, the center of gravity is inclined rearwardly and outwardly, and the forefoot is lifted so that most of the body weight is borne slightly to an outer side of a center of the calcaneus (FIG. 6B).

Thus, tension in the forefoot may be alleviated, pronation of the foot, ankle, and knee may be prevented, and corrections may be made for a wearer who has already begun to have pronation.

In addition, the lateral plantar arch recess 11 a may be formed in a region, supporting the calcaneus and the cuboid bone, and a certain region of a rear portion of the fourth and fifth metatarsal bones, of the lateral plantar arch support 11, and may also be formed in various regions within the area of the lateral plantar arch support 11 according to an age and sex of a wearer.

As the lateral plantar arch recess 11 a is formed, it is preferable that the thickness of the sock in a corresponding region is ⅓ to ⅔ of the thickness of a region excluding the lateral plantar arch recess 11 a.

For example, when the thickness of a region in which the lateral plantar arch recess 11 a is formed is 2 mm, the thickness of the bottom surface 10 excluding the lateral plantar arch recess 11 a is formed to be 4 mm.

The step structure of the thickness of the lateral plantar arch recess 11 a induces rearward and outward movement of the above-mentioned center of gravity and delays pronation.

In addition, weaving is performed in consideration of the thickness of corresponding regions in order to form the lateral plantar arch recess 11 a. As an example, the lateral plantar arch recess 11 a may be formed by making the entire bottom surface 10 have the same thickness, cutting and removing a certain region of the bottom surface 10 of the sock corresponding to the region of the lateral plantar arch recess 11 a, and sewing with a fabric having a thickness less than that of the bottom surface 10.

According to the present invention, the center of gravity of a wearer of the sock is moved rearward and outward while the wearer is standing, thereby reducing the load applied to the hallux, and the center of gravity of the wearer of the sock is moved to between first and second metatarsal bones sequentially through calcaneus, a cuboid bone, and a fifth metatarsal bone while the wearer is walking, thereby delaying pronation as much as possible and causing supination to more easily occur after pronation.

In addition, due to the delayed pronation, the waist is supported, and pronation distortion syndrome, arthritis, hallux valgus, and plantar fasciitis can be prevented.

The present invention has been described with reference to the examples illustrated in the drawings, but these are only examples. It will be understood by those skilled in the art that various modifications and equivalent other examples may be made.

Therefore, the scope of the present invention is defined by the appended claims. 

1. A sock worn on a foot and having a lateral plantar arch recess, wherein a bottom surface of the sock is formed with a lateral plantar arch recess in which a lateral plantar arch support configured to support a lateral plantar arch composed of calcaneus, a cuboid bone, and fourth and fifth metatarsal bones of a wearer is recessed from a lower surface in a predetermined region.
 2. The sock of claim 1, wherein the lateral plantar arch recess is formed in a region configured to support the calcaneus, the cuboid bone, and a certain portion of a rear portion of the fourth and fifth metatarsal bones of the lateral plantar arch support.
 3. The sock of claim 1, wherein the bottom surface of the sock excluding the lateral plantar arch recess is formed to have the same thickness, and the thickness of the lateral plantar arch recess is formed to be ⅓ to ⅔ of the thickness of the bottom surface of the sock excluding the lateral plantar arch recess.
 4. The sock of claim 2, wherein the lateral plantar arch recess is formed so that a boundary line located at an edge of a central side of the lateral plantar arch recess is rounded. 